


The Lilac Wood

by TheBraveHobbit



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo, The Last Unicorn - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, F/M, Gen, M/M, Platonic Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-10
Updated: 2013-06-10
Packaged: 2017-12-14 14:13:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/837792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBraveHobbit/pseuds/TheBraveHobbit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"There has never been a world without unicorns.”</p><p>“But there is! It’s out there. I’ve seen it, you know. There haven’t been any unicorns for a terrible long time. Even the songs are sad. They’re all gone.”</p><p>Setting the stage: the one where Enjolras takes advice from a lark.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Lilac Wood

The unicorn lived in a lilac wood, and he lived all alone. Although he did not know it, he was very old. Not that being old was of any consequence to the creature. His coat was white, and the faint glow of the sun on his back had shifted from silver to gold with the passing of time, but the brightness of his eye had not dimmed, nor had the sleekness of his mane diminished. He was still cloven of hoof and long of neck. Age had not made him less delicate of bone, nor had it dulled the sharp tip of the horn that spurred from between his ears.

It is a common misconception that unicorns are little more than horned horses, but he was hardly as large as a deer, smaller of frame and more graceful. His legs were thin and his tail more akin to a lion than an equine. Large golden eyes peered out of an angular skull, and his ears were tapered and narrow. The horn that graced his brow—for there was no other word to describe it—was as delicate and deadly as the rest of him. He had killed a dragon with it once. He had also knocked chestnuts from the boughs of trees into the paws of hungry bear cubs. 

Unicorns are immortal, and it is their nature to live alone. They spend their days beside crystal pools in forests granted eternal spring by their very presence. That is how it has always been, and how it will very likely always be; longer, at least, than humankind shall be in this world.

So it was with this unicorn, for years beyond counting, and so it would have remained, save not for a chance encounter that had more to do with fate than with chance. Such is the nature of fairy tales.

Early morning sun had begun to filter through the forest canopy, green light dancing on the surface of the pool as the unicorn sat pondering his reflection. Or rather, he was looking at his reflection. His own visage was well known to him and though he knew himself beautiful, he would rather spend his days thinking about the passage of time than his own fine face. Time, that did not touch him. Time, that spurred the creatures in his wood to live and love, to bear children and then to die. How strange a thing, time. It was a force outside of any magic the unicorn knew, and he was fascinated with it, though it held no power over him. Truly, he was not even equipped to study it, for his very presence stilled its power. He knew little the passage of days or months or seasons. Years meant nothing to him; they passed even as he pondered them.

 

Yet the sun was rising and there was light in the unicorn’s lilac wood, and the sound of horses caused the creature to lift his head. He was on his feet and gliding, moving with such care that even the leaves he brushed made no noise. Unicorns are gifted in this way. The horses and the humans they bore had no reason to notice him. He watched, and he listened. They were laughing, and the sound was pleasant enough, though it shattered the silence of the wood.

“Bossuet! If you don’t cease your laughter, we’ll never find game to down.” The horses walked close together, so that the men’s trousers brushed at the knee. The unicorn studied them intently. It had been some time since humans had graced his wood; indeed, they had spoken a different language when last he’d seen them. Their cloth was strange to him, but then, like most ideas contrived by humans, the unicorn found concept of clothing was a strange one.

They were a handsome pair of men to the unicorn’s generous eyes, mounted on simple brown horses and armed with longbows. There was no great ornamentation about either of them, though one wore a simple pair of golden spectacles and the other covered his bald crown with a woolen cap. Their voices were light and pleasant as they conversed, and it was plain to the unicorn that they were at their ease.

“You’re a fool if you expect to find game here, Jolllly.” Said the laughing man, his tongue seemingly carried away with the errant l’s. “Creatures in a unicorn’s forest have their own magical ways, you know.”

“You’ve been listening to Musichetta telling children’s stories again.” Joly giggled, reaching over to cuff Bossuet upon the shoulder. “Unicorns indeed. The reason we will find no game is your abysmal luck, not some storybook beast.”

“You know Musichetta’s grandmother claims to have seen one once.”

“And my great great grandfather rode with Napoleon. You don’t see me trying to claim the Baron de Pontmercy and his lark are anything but myth.”

“That’s different and well you know it.” Bossuet’s laughter never seemed to cease, and Joly’s expression was gentle as they spoke, despite the negativity of his words. “If this is not a unicorn’s forest, why is it always spring here? The leaves never fall, nor the snow. I’m telling you, there’s one unicorn left in the world, and as long as it lives in this forest we’ll have no luck bringing home dinner.”

Joly seemed to ponder this, but he shook his head. There was a smile on his lips as he said, “No, I’m sure there’s a scientific explanation, love.”

Bossuet laughed still further. “Science. Or magic. It makes me no difference.”

His companion reined in his horse, pivoting the animal on a narrow radius. “Let’s turn around then. Hunt somewhere else. The day is young; we can find game in a place less….”

_“Magical?”_

“Disconcerting. I distrust the meat of a creature from a place that never feels the sting of winter.”

Bossuet seemed willing to concede, and he likewise spun his beast. He paused, hand on his horse’s flank as he looked back over the lilac wood. “Were I you,” he said, his voice carrying well past the unicorn, though clearly not intended for any but he, “I would remain. Keep your trees green and protect your friends. This is no longer any world for you. You’re the last, you know.”

The unicorn was not inclined to cold, but a shiver ran down his hocks. He stood in the shadows long after the men had gone, staring down the path through the wood and contemplating their words.

“It could not be.” He said to himself, soon after dark had fallen. “I cannot be the last.”

The sound of his own voice, unuttered for nearly a century, sent thrills of fright through him. He wanted to run, and he did, racing himself and waking no creature that slept beneath the moon, stopping only when he had crested a hill that allowed him a clear view of the night sky. The unicorn arched his neck and studied the stars. There once were as many unicorns in the world as there were stars. How could he be the last?

“It simply cannot be.” The unicorn decided, resolutely, “The huntsmen were mistaken.” and he set his mind to think no more about it.

Time passed much as it always had, folding around the lilac wood without seeming to touch it, and the unicorn had no way of knowing if he had gone hours or days or years before his hooves carried him back to the path the huntsman had followed. He did not step upon it immediately, but looked solemnly at, considering it, this winding dirt trail that led into the world of men. It seemed to him that their voices yet echoed, and he shook his head, tossing his mane to be rid of them.

“Bee in your bonnet?” A lark had lit upon a branch very close to the unicorn’s face, and she trilled with laughter as he turned his face to see her better. “What a silly thought, a unicorn in a bonnet!”

The unicorn did not know what a bonnet was, and he did not care to inquire. This lark was a stranger to his lilac wood, and he thrilled to hear that she recognized him. “Do you see many unicorns, in your travels?”

“None! They’re all gone, you know. Down the red road.”

“The red road?” The unicorn had never heard of such a thing.

“Or, down the road in front of the great red bull. It’s a song I heard once. I didn’t like it very much. I don’t like sad songs.”

The unicorn lifted his nose, blowing hot air at the bird and sending little tufts of feather setting at odd angles. The lark puffed her chest in irritation and set to meticulously righting her plumage. “Sing it for me.” The unicorn requested.

“Who are you to say what a person sings, monsieur unicorn?” She watched him from beneath her wing, her beak picking at the feathers there, pushing them into place.

“I must hear it!”

“Have someone else sing it for you, then. I prefer to sing love songs.”

The unicorn supposed he should not be surprised. He had never heard a lark sing a sad song; it was typical of them to prefer romantic ballads to any other music, and he found it impressive that she had so much recollection of a song she found distasteful, even if she would not sing it.

“How did you know my name, if you had never seen another like me?”

“What a silly creature you are. First bonnets and now you think to be unknown? How could you be anything but what you are? You are more a unicorn than I am a lark.” She chirruped happily when she said his name, and it set his own heart thrilling. “I had never supposed unicorns to be silly. Do you suppose that’s why they’re all gone?”

“They cannot be gone. There has never been a world without unicorns.”

“But there is! It’s out there.” The lark hopped, spinning on the branch so that she was facing the trail that led out of the lilac wood, leaning down to whisper conspiratorially in one of the unicorn’s delicately tapered ears. “I’ve seen it, you know. There haven’t been any unicorns for a terrible long time. Even the songs are sad. They’re all gone.”

“Down the red road?”

“Before the red bull.”

The unicorn did not want to know about the red bull. He did not want to leave his lilac wood. The word of a lark and a single human huntsman could not be taken for fact. Doubt gnawed at his heart. It is rare for unicorns to face uncertainty, for they are creatures of whimsy and sureness. And yet the unicorn felt divided. He had never left his lilac wood, and the part of him that wished to stay was not insignificant. For all his long life, the unicorn had been alone. Never before had he been _lonely_. It had always been enough to simply know that others like he existed. He shifted from hoof to hoof, restless. It is rare for a unicorn to be restless.

“Then I must go to them. Is this the road they followed?”

“Why would I know a thing like that?” The lark alit, hovering in the air before his nose. “What marvelously silly creatures unicorns are.”

The unicorn dipped his horn forward, tapping her gently upon the bill. “I hope you have the opportunity to sing many happy songs, little lark.” He had thought it a fitting farewell, and the joyous trilling that followed her flight lifted his heart some.

He was glad of that. Stepping from the greenery and onto the open path might have proved too much, had his heart not had the echoes of her song to hold it upright. He was leaving his lilac wood. He was leaving his friends and his crystalline pool, his hilltop beneath the stars.

“Do not look back.” He told himself, and he lifted his head proudly as he took a single slow step, and then another, and another. “I will return as soon as I am able.”

There had never been a world without unicorns.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a crossover/fantasy AU. All of the pairings listed above will have an appearance at some point in the work (some romantically, some platonically, some with the lines blurred). 
> 
> The main body of the story is going to focus on Grantaire and Enjolras, but Courfeyrac, Eponine, and Gavroche will play leading roles as well. The others will come in and out of the story less frequently.


End file.
